Night Airship

On my way to Washington, DC to visit Brian and Dana; they are presenting an early Thanksgiving and I am flying in quickly over the weekend.  Haven't been to DC since a vacation many, so many years ago, funny that he now lives there amid marble and pomp.  The plane has an organized manner of boarding; you line up according to a number on your pass and file in when called.  No prearranged seating, you sit where available.  I was able to be near a window, just behind the wing.  The acceleration of take off is the best roller coaster ride in the world, and we rose in the navigable air, temporarily headed west.

I can see my house, meaning apartment building; we flew over the city and the Olmstead spoke pattern of street design led to City Hall.  Well, I live just a few blocks down, (now at 10,000 feet); I spotted the water tower atop the building.  The dark beyond is the lake.  It is beautiful at night, the illuminated minuscule globes of human invention delineate roads, shops, neighborhoods.  We have turned to the east; goodbye Lake, goodbye cats, goodbye eardrums.

A miracle just as voluble hangs at the horizon: a wide band of a pale blue glow, the tail of the sun ribboning the edge of black night as it is still day to the west, with the spilled ink of night seeping toward the cities of the plains. (Now at 25,000 feet).  The golden necklaces of coruscating lights below are as casually tossed about as the midnight disrobing by an intoxicated debutante.  Streets and buildings align in undulating light; as close as we are, they can be seen individually, like beads.

The plane is shuddering in clear air, and we are told to refasten seat belts.  Well of course we are bouncing about; it is unusual not to encounter roiling atmosphere, for air moves as much as ocean waves.  Very similar to water is air; just thinner; we are a ship upon its sea.  Does air have waves or tides?  If the moon pulls on the water, does it pull on the substance of air?  Think of how a kite moves, and there you go.

But now, good heavens, we are beginning descent; Hello New Jersey!  It doesn't seem as if we were airborne 15 minutes at the top of the proscribed arc of trajectory, the ship has rose and fell in an extended arch; the glow of cities spot the landscape below. (10,000 feet).  I could reach my hand out the window to gather gold and diamonds; I must fly somewhere closer to Christmas at night, to see houses from above bedecked in red and green incandescent brocade.

Whoa, there's a large city ahead, showing miles of orange and gold lights spread like butter on toast.  I'm hungry.  So many people, so many houses.  Where does the electricity come from?  A lot of it arrives from Niagara Falls, sold to companies lining the eastern seaboard.  Electricity generates magnetic fields, repellant and attractive.  Linemen have to learn of this fascinating physical force when stringing power lines, that you don't want bumping together when the field is created.

We wheel in gently, a roc following a lessening gyre.  My son.  My son is waiting for me, magnetized by an unbreakable link in the repelling and attracting seesaw of mother and child.  I cannot wait to see him.

What the hell is in Baltimore?  Besides crabcakes?  I know nothing of this city except for a rough reputation many years ago.  The wing now tips to the center of the radius, then evens out, slowing.  Orioles and cake.  The wing gracefully tips and levels again; the plane slows, the tail begins to drop and  engines become quiet.  Where the hell is Baltimore?  Individual buildings reappear.  My heavens, did I say this place was large?  We float as a feather; each turn releases energy and pulls us into further descent.  Fog makes fuzzy ghost shapes surround the lit areas of the ground.  I see a star.

There is the Chesapeake Bay; we are over water, and a bridge is glowing, a seeming skeletal spine of brontosaurus watching us, the ballet of metal carving air into perfect geometric arcs.  Engines slow even more, the tips of the wings are folded up as a paper airplane.  Oh my gosh, look, look at the lighted ground, as good as day.  Fog.  Landing gear.  A rush to decelerate and stop.  My son.